GameInformer will cover the now officially announced Witcher 3: Wild Hunt in their upcoming print issue. The title is slated for a release in 2014 for PC & nextgen consoles…More information.

Maylander

February 5th, 2013 12:39

Bigger than Skyrim eh? I would love to see them pull it off, but it does sound a bit over ambitious.

I'm looking forward to it regardless.

vurt

February 5th, 2013 14:07

"We will combine story driven and open-world RPGs for the first time." (from one of many, many TW2 interviews where they say it's open world).

Fool me once, shame on you… fool me twice, shame on me. ;)

joxer

February 5th, 2013 14:38

Never seen that interview. Nor was fooled.

I was howerver fooled into Skyrim. Expected an almost bugfree game as TW2 and DX:HR were. Fool me once… Fool me twice… Will I reg. on TES online? Absolutely not. :p

If there was a preorder option for TW3 today, I'd instantly preorder it. Can't wait to have it on my machine. That and this:

Quote:

Free expansion packs will release after the launch of Wild Hunt next year, akin to The Witcher 2's continuous, free post-release support.

Just as in case of TW1 and TW2, no bugfixes from modders needed. And no turning fans into cows then milking them with suspicious and probably overexpensive DLC. Who's a fool and who was fooled, vurt?

Last but not least, the respect for the community and their wishes is obvious:

Quote:

quick-time events are out entirely

Listening to fans is something both Behesda and JoWood failed to do, Bethesda refuses to do the bugfixing already, and JoWood went even further by turning Gothic4 into something that's not Gothic.

vurt

February 5th, 2013 14:53

Must have missed a lot of interviews then, because they said that quite a few times about TW2.

Open world games like TES will never be as bug free as linear game like TW2 or DX:HR. There's a million more things to take into account when doing true open world games like the old Gothic's, Ultimas or TES. Bethesda is the only developer that still does it, and even if it has a few bugs (nothing game breaking for me personally so far, just graphical glitches) i'll gladly take that instead of boring linearity and limited exploration.

Haven't bought any of the Skyrim DLC's and i'm not planning to until they are a lot cheaper and come as a bundle or something, so i wouldnt say i've been fooled :)

Daroou

February 5th, 2013 15:24

To be fair, CD Project has provided uncalled-for levels of support with the first two Witcher games while Bethesda consistently abandons their bug-infested games. That said, I enjoyed Skyrim more than TW2 RPG on rails. So maybe TW3 will be the best of both worlds..??? I hope so!

Cacheperl

February 5th, 2013 15:28

I think its good to have games like skyrim on the one hand, and the witcher on the other. It appeals to different groups.

Of course there's always room for combining the best of both worlds. If it works.

vurt

February 5th, 2013 15:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Daroou
(Post 1061182918)

To be fair, CD Project has provided uncalled-for levels of support with the first two Witcher games while Bethesda consistently abandons their bug-infested games.

when CDP sells 3.5 million copies in 48h like Skyrim they wont give a shit about a few bugs that might piss off a few thousand fans only, so don't worry, they'll get there too one day ;)

crpgnut

February 5th, 2013 15:49

I know several female crpg players, thanks to some young cousins. None of them play the Witcher because they can't identify with the ugly main character and they can't play as Triss. Until CDProject realizes that there is a large and growing larger set of female players, they'll miss out on the Skyrim and Bioware types of numbers. Since women are treated as sex objects in the Witcher series, it is a massive fail on that front.

Also the Witcher is linear as can be with only two diverging paths. It's not even really a choice and consequences game because there are so few choices. I enjoyed one for what it was but game two had Geriatric Geralt so old that I couldn't relate to him either.

joxer

February 5th, 2013 16:00

I can't identify with plastic-boobs and nocelulite-butt female protagonists in fantasy genre so I can perfectly understand someone not capable of identifying with sexy ugliness in dirty clothes. :D

Sex objects or sex toys, who cares? You have an option to do it or not to do it in the game. I enjoyed collecting cards, if you believe that's scandalous, just don't do it.

Well I will believe it when I see it. Bethesda had a much larger team working longer on Skyrim and a bunch more experience. I never had all these huge bug fests that certain posters seemed to have, oh well.

I think they may be over ambitious here.

Oh, and the collecting cards was as childish as you could possibly get.

Lemonhead

February 5th, 2013 16:39

Great if they can pull it off, I'll have a wait and see attitude for this one. I hope jumping/climbing/swimming type exploration will be in.

Moriendor

February 5th, 2013 16:59

Wait and see here as well. But mostly because I want the complete game so I'm not buying The Witcher 3 before they have released the inevitable Enhanced Edition.

Arkadia7

February 5th, 2013 17:10

I also didn't get either witcher game for a few reasons, one major one was because I don't like the way they force you to play as the main character geralt who I find very unappealing. You would think they would allow for a little customization in the way the main character looks, instead of forcing one to play as a freak show. That said, if witcher 3 allows for a bit more personalization and has an open world combined with a strong story, I will definitely take a close look at it.

DeepO

February 5th, 2013 17:17

There hasnīt been a great AAA open world game since F:NV, good to finally see a likely candidate for a next one to be in the works.

Three different aspects to narration
- Lowest level: free-form activities like monster hunting, crafting, individual standalone quests
- Second step: political situation and Nilfgaardian invasion is resolved through the core plotline of the major areas (Skellige, Novigrad, No Man’s Land)
- Each land has its own storyline
- Can abandon the storyline, but will have repercussions later
- Not doing a plotline is a choice the player has
- Main narrative: search for Geralt’s loved ones and conflict with the Wild Hunt
- Multiple branches of narratives that feed into each other
- Don’t have to do anything outside the main storyline to beat the game
- Could have help in a main-line encounter from an ally you gained in the Skellige archipelago if you’ve completed certain quests in certain ways
- Major events in the main storyline are “gates” for the state of the world

Sounds like a good plan to retain the strengths of the first two games in a more open environment.

ChienAboyeur

February 5th, 2013 17:43

A lot of features coming in. Hard to see why they could not a world bigger than Skyrim.

Not sure that the game includes time passing by as the width of the gameworld is measured in minutes, not in game days.

The in game days width matters the most.

azarhal

February 5th, 2013 18:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by rune_74
(Post 1061182928)

Well I will believe it when I see it. Bethesda had a much larger team working longer on Skyrim and a bunch more experience. I never had all these huge bug fests that certain posters seemed to have, oh well.

I think they may be over ambitious here.

Oh, and the collecting cards was as childish as you could possibly get.

Dev team size doesn't correlate into game content or quality. Bigger dev team tend to try stuff a lot more, aka they spend more time on cut/replaced gameplay systems.

Kostas

February 5th, 2013 18:20

Hope the do not bite more than they can chew.

jhwisner

February 5th, 2013 18:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by azarhal
(Post 1061182954)

Dev team size doesn't correlate into game content or quality. Bigger dev team tend to try stuff a lot more, aka they spend more time on cut/replaced gameplay systems.

Also the CDPR cost for developer man-hours might be significantly lower. Not sure how much game programmer and artists time costs companies in Poland, but I imagine it's less than in the US. They may actually not have to make due with as comparatively small a total man-hour budget as one might suspect.